1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a smartcard with a contactless microcircuit, in other words a microcircuit capable of communicating with an external device without a need to establish a mechanical contact. The present invention relates more specifically to a smartcard with a sufficient protection against forgery in order to be suitable to be used as an identity card, for instance. The term ‘smartcard’ should in this application be interpreted to cover at least identity cards, driver's licenses, payment cards, credit cards and data sheets for passports.
2. Description of Prior Art
Previously there is known a smartcard with a contactless microcircuit. This smartcard has been manufactured of a non-transparent material, which has made it possible to hide the microcircuit in the card such that the microcircuit can not be seen.
A problem relating to the above mentioned smartcard is insufficient security against forgery. A forger might try to remove information which is marked on the card and to replace such removed information with some other information. In addition, a forger might try to split the card into pieces in order to replace a part of the smartcard. Such attempts might be difficult to observe due to the non-transparent material of the smartcard.